The Seamless and Natural Way of the Samurai
by readerofasaph
Summary: After Nationals, Nanjirou struggles with his changing relationship with his son and with tennis; in the meantime, he strikes up a peculiar friendship with Atobe as the latter pursues the secret of ten'i muhou no kiwami. Part I up so far of a probable two.


Nanjirou had just about accepted that his son had turned into a vacuous smiling amnesiac with no tennis skills, when they heard the helicopter approach from the opposite side of the mountain.

"What's that noise?" Ryoma rose from the rock he'd been sitting cross-legged on, and sprang upwards, lightly, to the adjacent boulder, looking in the direction of the sound. Perched on slippery granite with hair soaked in waterfall spray, eyes eager, he resembled the way Rinko looked, sometimes, whenever she encountered something new and delightful. Nanjirou hadn't seen Ryoma look so naïve since he was about eight years old.

The helicopter crested the peak and began a steady descent, tilting sideways as it navigated past steepled pines. Ryoma maintained his fascinated gaze. Nanjirou fished around in his robe for a packet of cigarettes that wasn't waterlogged. He found one, new and unopened and hence preserved by its plastic wrapping, but the accompanying matchbox was less lucky; it was crumpled with damp.

He struck a futile match, chewed on an unlit cigarette and squatted down, wringing out water from the flap of his robe. The helicopter hovered, turned its nose down, and headed to a conveniently placed patch of sandy ground about sixty yards away.

A blue-and-white figure was already emerging from the cabin before the skids touched land. It ran towards them, yelling, voice carrying surprisingly well despite the competing noises of spinning rotors and waterfall: "Oi Echizen! ....the _heck_..... doing? The finals with Rikkai have already started!"

It took Nanjirou several seconds to process why he looked familiar - _bicycle idiot, sometimes picks Ryoma up for tennis, name's Mimi or Momo or something silly like that_ - during which three things happened: Ryoma leaped from the boulder to the bank of the stream; two more teenagers (wearing a different blue-and-white uniform) came out of the helicopter; and the spiky-haired idiot grabbed Ryoma by the shoulders.

"Who am I? What do you mean, who am I? It's not a good time for jokes, you know!" He stepped back, perplexed, and looked at Ryoma carefully. "Is something wrong?"

The other two boys had drawn close by now, coming to stand beside Ryoma's schoolmate. They were both very good-looking, the type that received confessions from cute girls all the time. Nanjirou disliked them immediately.

The taller of the two, a long-haired boy wearing dark-rimmed spectacles, spotted him and walked around to the bank. "Excuse me, but are you with this boy? Do you know what's happened to him?"

"-- you don't know what your _name_ is?"

"We don't have time for this." The voice was imperious. "Momoshiro, get Echizen into the helicopter."

Nanjirou squinted at the third newcomer, the one who'd just spoken. The boy turned, hair blowing lightly in the wind, and stared coolly back. "You," he said, with no care for age or formality, "are you coming with us?"

Brats these days had absolutely no respect. Nanjirou yawned and stretched his legs out, considering the decision. _National finals, huh?_ The old hag'd be there, and a bunch of sweaty teenage boys with smelly feet and armpits. Playing kid's tennis. Not very appealing, all things considered.

On the other hand, there was no train back to Tokyo until evening. He hadn't brought any magazines to pass the time with, and with his idiot son in this condition it was probably better if Nanjirou kept an eye on him. Troublesome as it was.

Ah well. Perhaps there'd be some cute girls among the spectators.

"Why not?" He jumped to the other side of the stream, spitting out his chewed cigarette as he did so, and landed in front of the third boy, the arrogant one, bringing a healthy number of flying droplets with him. "Let's move, kid."

The boy didn't flicker an eyelid as water beaded his face and uniform. "Follow me." He swung on one heel and sauntered back to the helicopter. Nanjirou fantasised seeing a hot pink KICK ME sign taped to that straight, young back, but nevertheless, followed. Everyone followed: Bicycle Idiot, Ryoma, Spectacles, in that order.

They trailed after the boy in procession, Nanjirou forming the tail, and entered the helicopter one by one. Nanjirou was pleased to track wet muddy footprints onto the cabin floor - and then clutched at a non-existent handhold as the engine started and they rose in mid-air abruptly.

Point to Obnoxious Brat, 30-15.

*****

Ryoma won a national championship, and came home as disrespectful and uncute as he'd ever been. Rinko made fried fish for dinner, Nanako burbled congratulations, and Nanjirou made a show of looking unimpressed but it was half-hearted. Fact was _something_ important had happened today, even if he couldn't quite say what.

He considered it during his after-dinner smoke, lying sideways on the porch with an unopened magazine and two of Tokyo's noisiest cicadas for company. The summer evening stopped just short of being unbearably warm. It was hard to think of Ryoma or even tennis in this comfortable heat, especially when his stomach was so satisfyingly full. He began to feel sleepy in spite of the wretched sound the cicadas were making.

The sensation of fur tickling his left foot brought him back to full alertness. It was Karupin, who wandered over and began to peer at him inquisitively. Nanjirou lifted his cigarette and flicked ash at her ears, and when that failed to garner a reaction, reached out to tweak her tail.

Footsteps sounded behind him - Ryoma's, judging from the sound. Probably looking for Karupin. The boy could be so sentimental about his cat sometimes. Must have gotten it from Rinko.

"Hey kid," he said, as Ryoma stepped around and squatted in order to pick Karupin up, "did you have fun today?"

Ryoma frowned for a moment, as if he might actually be thinking about the answer, and then shrugged. "A bit."

Nanjirou scrutinised him - all dark serious eyes and scrawny limbs, skin bathed in deep golden sunset. It felt like the boy'd grown taller since they came back to Japan, or maybe just older. "You didn't play too badly today. For a kid."

Ryoma's arms tightened around Karupin. Then he turned and began to walk away.

"Hey!" Nanjirou began, and then gave up as Ryoma disappeared into the living room. Saying _mada mada_ to the empty space his son had left just seemed too uncool, so he contented himself with the thought of tormenting the kid the next time he asked Nanjirou for a game.

The request didn't come as soon as expected. The first two days were unsurprising - Ryoma'd often held out that long before, when he was feeling particularly pissed off or sometimes just sick. After the third day of Ryoma coming home late without explanation, however, Nanjirou couldn't help but cave in and ask Nanako. She looked surprised and said: "Oh, didn't Ryoma tell you, Uncle? Because his club seniors are retiring after this week, they'll be doing activities together every afternoon. Do you miss him? Poor Uncle. "

Nanjirou felt himself twitch. He spent the fourth day cycling around the neighbourhood and sampling ramen shops; when he'd finally run out of money he waddled back to temple grounds and stared at the tennis court longingly. Then he climbed up to the bell tower, all bloated with soup and noodle, and lay in the belfry until nightfall, reading the new issue of _American Swimsuit Girl_ he'd picked up in the combini that morning.

On the fifth day, Obnoxious Brat showed up.

Nanjirou had indigestion overnight due to his eating spree and slept in until lunchtime. When he finally emerged from his bedroom, there was nobody at home. Rinko was working; Nanako had gone to college to use the library, and her mother was out doing something, probably grocery shopping. Nanjirou entered the kitchen, carefully avoiding tripping over Karupin, and searched for something appetising and immediately edible. These efforts proving unsuccessful, he yawned, and tried to think of something entertaining to do.

The doorbell rang.

Nanjirou padded over to the front door, opened it, and immediately tried to slide it shut again.

But the boy had already inserted one leg into the doorway. He was wearing dark blue Nike sports shoes, too sturdy to transmit much pain from Nanjirou's barefooted and ineffectual attempts to kick his foot out of the way. The boy grabbed the door's edge, and with one smooth motion was standing in the doorway; one hand placed against the doorjamb, the other holding the sliding door wide open.

"I came to ask you for a match," he said.

The battle for the front door lost, Nanjirou folded his arms across his chest and sniffed, before putting on his best _gaijin_ accent: "I am sorry. I do not understand what you are saying- "

"Echizen Nanjirou. Inoue Mamoru told me you could be difficult." The boy raised one hand and snapped his fingers. "Kabaji."

"Usu." A tall bulky figure loomed up from behind the boy. Nanjirou barely had time to take in the appearance of the newcomer before he found his arms secured firmly behind his back, and his body being dragged outside.

"Wait, what are you doing? You can't _do_ this sort of thing!" He struggled against the Kabaji-person's grip for several seconds, which proved futile, and then, when he was already halfway across the front yard, managed to direct a backwards kick at the overgrown boy's right shin.

The hold loosened, just enough for Nanjirou to twist himself out of Kabaji's grasp. He turned, intending to dash back into the house.

A flicker of movement at the edge of his vision caught his attention. He stopped in midstride, and stared.

The boy whose name Nanjirou still didn't know was standing in the yard with a silver racquet, tossing a tennis ball up in the air. He brought his arm back and then swung in a long powerful hit; the ball flew forwards -

- hit the ground, and then skidded along with a furious spin, unbouncing, out the front gate to the sidewalk, before rolling out onto the road and coming to a stop.

Kabaji stepped forward, apparently recovered from the attack, but didn't attempt to restrain Nanjirou.

Then again, Nanjirou hadn't moved since the boy began his serve.

Without bothering to retrieve the fallen ball, the boy came over and looked Nanjirou in the eye.

"I'm Atobe Keigo," he said. "Play a match with me."

*****

By the end of the first game, Nanjirou was starting to enjoy himself. Obnoxious Brat was almost as fun to toy with as Ryoma was. He took his kid's tennis so _seriously_, running from corner to corner to retrieve Nanjirou's balls with an earnestness which would have been cute if he'd been five years younger with some baby fat. And the way his eyes narrowed whenever Nanjirou tossed a sudden drop shot or a rapid smash at him, was just too amusing for words.

It wasn't as easy to piss him off as Nanjirou had anticipated, though. That was a little disappointing.

When the set finished at 6-0, Obnoxious Brat gathered up his things and said: "Tomorrow, same time."

It was a statement, not a question. Nanjirou didn't reflect on this too hard until the next day, and then the day after, by which time it became clear that when Obnoxious Brat made a statement, he made it with the approximate forcefulness that the old hag had wielded, back in Nanjirou's junior high days. It'd been a long time since anyone had been able to _make_ him play tennis.

(Not that even the old hag could make him play if he really didn't want to, of course. But most days he'd give some face to her requests. If he felt like it.)

The third match they played, Obnoxious Brat changed tactics halfway through and started attacking. After five minutes of this Nanjirou raised his brows.

"Kid," he said, smirking, "That kind of tennis suits you better."

Atobe scowled, but his concentration didn't falter. Nanjirou didn't let him get a single point for the rest of the afternoon.

"What was monkey king doing here?" asked Ryoma that night. He'd finally broken his pattern of father-avoidance today, stopping by the temple grounds for a quick practice just as Atobe was on his way out.

It took a few seconds for his query to penetrate Nanjirou's fog of concentration, focused as it was on an appealing centrespread of cleavage (attached to tall Scandinavian blonde) emerging from a backdrop of strategically arranged evergreen foliage. It took even longer for Nanjirou to process his son's words adequately to mount the appropriate response.

"Is that what you call him?" He threw his head back and guffawed. "Ahahahahahah! That's perfect! I can't wait to tell him that."

Ryoma stood halfway up the stairs, watching his father. When he was younger he would have repeated the question in hopes of a proper answer; these days he would, after a certain interval of waiting, simply shrug and go somewhere else. While this passive-aggresive strategy was rather unspunky, (a tad girly. A tad too much like Rinko.) it was, Nanjirou had to admit, one of the few things Ryoma did that succeeded in frustrating him. After all, it wasn't like Nanjirou ever _not_-heard Ryoma's questions. It was just a question of whether and when he chose to answer them, and Ryoma's ultimatum tactics prevented Nanjirou from drawing it out as long as he would have liked.

"It's a secret! If you want to know," he pulled a face and stuck out his tongue, "then beat me at a game of tennis!"

"Stupid father." Ryoma resumed climbing the stairs, but not before shooting his father a baleful look. Satisfied, Nanjirou used his toes to flip the magazine page over to an overhead shot of a statuesque Latino female wrapped in nothing but translucent shimmering gold cloth.

He was less amused the next day when Obnoxious Brat didn't show up at all, but forgot it when Ryoma came home and and they had a real set, the kind where Nanjirou was barely holding back at all (okay, still quite a bit. But considerably less than last year or even last month). The balance of their routines was restored. Ryoma went to school, came back at the usual time, lost. If there was any change in the way things were it was in the expression in Ryoma's eyes at the end of each match, in how the losses seemed to matter _less_ these days. But that had been going on for a while now. Ever since Seigaku, really.

Obnoxious Brat returned on the weekend with a doorknock too inexorable to be Nanako returning from her Saturday shopping. Nanjirou dragged his feet out to the porch, pulled the cigarette out of his mouth and breathed smoke into the boy's face. "Where were you?" he demanded.

"I said I'd see you next week," Atobe said loftily. "Don't you _listen_?"

This time he got one game off Nanjirou, and sneered. "What's going on, old man? Did your age finally catch up with you?"

He was standing at the net with his racquet resting lightly across both hands, casually fingering the strings. He held his body with the easy confidence of a rich kid - one of the good ones, the ones that had been slightly interesting to defeat when Nanjirou was Ryoma's age. Posture held in studied carelessness, movements choreographed to look natural.

His face sure looked pissed off, though.

Nanjirou shrugged exaggeratedly, and switched his racquet over to his right hand.

He beat Obnoxious Brat twelve more times after that. The boy always made sure to tell him the time of their next meeting, and short of that first match, had never turned up without advance notice. (Not that it mattered to Nanjirou, except on really boring days when he'd go sit on the baseline of the court and see whether Obnoxious Brat would arrive late for once. He never did.)

In December, Rinko announced that they were moving back.

Ryoma was upset. Rinko saw the sudden shuttered expression on his face and reached out with one arm, a tentative attempt to embrace him. He refused to to move closer to her; her hand rested on his shoulder briefly, before falling away. They'd buy him a Wii to take home to New York, she said.

Ryoma crouched down and patted Karupin, who'd been pawing at his heels, and didn't say anything.

He was furious and alert when playing Nanjirou the next afternoon, chasing balls with an intense recklessness usually seen only before an important tournament. (Also during that time when Ryoma's eyes had started to change, not long after he'd begun playing for Seigaku.)

Nanjirou fed him some fast balls, and then slow, tricky ones that required control and level-headedness to return. The kid's frustration was obvious and enjoyable to watch.

"There'll be stronger guys to face back home," Nanjirou told him, after finishing him off in an hour-long set. Ryoma stared up at him, chest drawing and expanding with silent puffs of breath. The kid was much fitter than he'd been at the beginning of spring.

Nanjirou felt happy about this.

"There's somebody I want to beat. Here." It was spoken low enough to be a mumble, but pronounced clearly; and the kid's gaze was steady, although not focused on Nanjirou's face. In fact, he couldn't tell if the kid was trying to look past him or _through_ him. A strange, unsettled feeling ghosted through his body.

"Eh, then you should beat him before we go back!" When Ryoma didn't reply, he added: "Or aren't you strong enough?"

Or perhaps - just from the sudden, unusual emotion that flickered through Ryoma's eyes - he didn't really want to defeat whoever it was?

The question was annoying enough to distract Nanjirou while slurping shoyu ramen at his favourite shop a week later; he used one chopstick to stir at salty soup and thought about the way Ryoma played. The kid's tennis had become a lot more interesting, these last few months. It had been a good idea to send him to the old hag.

Acknowledging that made him feel strangely empty inside, even though he was already halfway through his second bowl. To distract himself, he picked up a piece of thinly-sliced beef and began chewing at it noisily.

"So Tezuka leaves for Germany next month, and Echizen is going back to the States. Are you sure you'll be all right for next year? Do try not to fail pathetically."

"Hey, hey, don't underestimate us like that! We're still the team that beat you twice, you know. By the way, it's your treat today, right?"

"Hmmph. Don't worry. It'd be unspeakably pathetic to expect you to pay, given the size of your allowance."

Nanjirou turned around, mouth still stuffed full, and saw Obnoxious Brat and Bicycle Idiot sitting at the table behind him. They were dressed in school uniform; in deference to the heat of the shop, Obnoxious Brat had taken off his blazer and hung it on the back of the chair where he was seated. The knot of his tie was loose, the top three buttons of his shirt undone. Bicycle Idiot was poring over the laminated card that served as a menu with the anticipatory expression of a true ramen enthusiast.

Nanjirou thought about spraying the two of them with with saliva-flavoured soy sauce soup, and then decided that he would rather swallow his food instead. He did so with a rather loud gulp, and Bicycle Idiot looked up.

"Eh, Ryoma's father!" He let the menu slip out from between his fingers and fall back onto the table. "Are you here for an afternoon snack as well?"

"When are you leaving the country?"

Caught off-guard by the sudden question, Bicycle Idiot - Momoshiro, Nanjirou now remembered, although why the name should matter he wasn't sure - frowned at Obnoxious Brat, who had focused his eyes on Nanjirou. Lazy twist to his posture, one arm draped across the back of his chair - but his facial expression belied his apparent unconcern.

Nanjirou tried to remember the date Rinko had said, and counted the days off on his fingers. He ran out of fingers. "In two weeks," he said.

"So soon?" A frown - almost a scowl, in fact - etched itself across his face . "Saturday week then. Usual time."

"Am I missing something here?" Momoshiro looked from one face to another. "Atobe, what's going on?"

Nanjirou decided it was time to leave. He stood up, causing the legs of his chair to scrape the floor. "Whatever. Pay for my ramen!" he said over his shoulder.

The next time he showed up at the store they didn't accuse him of an eat-and-run, which probably meant that the Obnoxious Brat had decided to pay. Rich kid like that, probably wouldn't even notice the cost.

He wasn't surprised or even bothered to find himself looking forward to Saturday. He rearranged his collection of magazines and placed them in suitcases sealed tightly with locks only he knew the combination to; kept playing Ryoma everyday; took Nanako to the zoo where she giggled as they tried to feed the monkeys rice crackers and he accidentally fell into the swamp twice.

For their twelfth and final match, they both showed up early. (Mainly because Nanjirou had been loitering on temple grounds all morning, mostly reading pornography in the belfry and occasionally ringing the bell with one foot hooked into the attached rope. He had almost fallen asleep when Obnoxious Brat arrived.)

Obnoxious Brat played as if he didn't know the meaning of control. Fast serves, big hits; shots that, coming from him, didn't seem anything except wild and uncontrolled. (In Ryoma they would have been just normal.) In terms of kid's tennis he lacked nothing: speed, power, reflexes. The old hag would have said he had talent. Nanjirou, though--

Talent. What was that anyway?

In the end he glared at Nanjirou, panting heavily, racquet fallen at his feet. "You never showed it to me, old man."

Nanjirou found a lone cigarette sitting in the pocket of his robe. He dug a bit deeper, and found a small, bottle-green lighter as well. "Show you what?"

A stare like the one Ryoma had granted him two weeks ago, only _at_ Nanjirou instead of through him. "_Ten'i muhou._"

Nanjirou looked at Atobe, at the sweat coating his evenly-tanned skin, at his expensive tennis shoes and the intensity of his eyes and the lean, cultivated muscle of his arms. He lit up his cigarette. "_Ten'i muhou_? Give it up, kid. Someone like you could never reach it."


End file.
